Update: The Hart Family Case

“The problem is, these women look normal.”

The post above that I wrote back in 2019 seems to be one of the most common ways that people discover my blog. I think it got posted on Reddit somewhere. I thought I’d offer an update with some other sources to check out if, like me, you still can’t get Markis, Hannah, Devonte, Jeremiah, Abigail, and Ciera out of your head.

On March 28, 2018, Jennifer Hart drove a van with her six children and wife, Sarah Hart, off a cliff. Sarah and the kids had high levels of Benadryl in their system and were all likely unconscious. Jennifer was legally drunk, but it was no accident. These women intentionally killed themselves and all six children as CPS was once again closing in on them. Two of the children had recently told neighbors about the abuse they were experiencing at home, and the Harts had a history of encounters with CPS.

A few resources:

I mention this in my 2019 post, but there is a Broken Harts podcast that’s ten episodes available via Spotify and Apple Podcasts and iHeart. What I liked about this series is that it gives you more insight of the relationship between Jen and Sarah, as well as more insight into Sarah, who I think is harder for people to figure out. It goes into the abuse allegations, about how the kids were isolated, about the narrative that Jen spun about their family and how eagerly people believed her white savior nonsense.

There is also a Broken Harts documentary via Discovery +. This one gives some insight into how the system failed these kids, which is a really important aspect of this case.

There’s another documentary called A Thread of Deceit that I found via Amazon Prime. I was less impressed with this one. It featured a lot of their friends and acquaintances who were sympathetic toward Jen and Sarah and I personally was put off by that. But if you’re interested in the perspective of their friends, this is the one to watch.

There is now a book out called We Were Once a Family that’s very good – what I loved about this is that it centers the children and their bio families, and delves quite a bit into the very problematic and very racist foster care system in the U.S. I was glad the author didn’t write as much about Jen and Sarah and focused on the actual victims, and the systems that failed them.

There are also lots of random true crime podcast episodes you can find if you search.

I personally think the Broken Harts podcast and We Were Once a Family will give you the most comprehensive understanding of how the hell all of this happened.

My thoughts on theories and chatter about the case now…

Devonte is alive: I don’t believe that Devonte is alive, and most people who initially hoped he survived have accepted that he’s not. I know there are people who still hope that he’s out there somewhere in hiding, but I sincerely believe that he died in 2018 along with his siblings.

Devonte was killed elsewhere and Jen and Sarah staged the accident to cover up his murder: It’s possible, as that’s something that definitely would have made them panic, run, and ultimately choose murder-suicide. Part of why this theory became somewhat popular is it more easily explains Jen and Sarah’s actions. If they’d killed him in a fit of rage, and wanted to cover it up, staging an accident is an effective way to do that. And, if this theory is true, it worked, because his remains were never found. That said, I personally believe he died in the wreck along with his siblings and that his remains never being found was a coincidence.

Jen reacted the way she did in part because she figured out or the kids confessed that it was Devonte who had been going to the neighbors, and that because she had favored him, she felt so betrayed that she decided to kill them all. I do think this is a very credible theory. We have no idea what went on in that house when Jen got the notice from CPS. Abigail had already snuck out and told the neighbors about the abuse, though Jen did her best to cover it up. We don’t know that she knew Devonte had also snuck out, but it’s very plausible that she became aware that he was behind this latest CPS visit, and if she did know it was him, she would have felt incredibly betrayed, as she did favor him.

It’s also possible that the kids had been fighting back in other ways. We have no idea what was going on in that home, but because the kids were older – they ranged from 12 to 19 – it’s reasonable to think that they were beginning to resist Jen and Sarah more and more.

Jen and Sarah chose death over accountability at the point where it seemed that the kids had finally had the upper hand. The days of coaching them on what to say to CPS were over. Two of them had snuck out and sought help. There may have been more acts of resistance that we’ll never know about. Fleeing their house with nothing packed the night they got the notice tells me that they had some idea that the neighbors knew something, and/or the kids were going to tell CPS the truth, and they were about to be in a whole fuckton of trouble.

Why did they take the kids with them instead of just killing themselves? A lot of people say it was Jen’s “if I can’t have you, no one can” attitude – possessiveness, control, maybe even wanting to punish the kids for trying to break free. I also think it was to preserve their reputations. They thought a tragic accidental death would put an end to their looming loss of control and exposure in the sense that they wouldn’t have to deal with the consequences, and that no one would ever know the truth. Jen’s web of lies would remain in tact and everyone would remember them as wonderful caring parents.

Why would they choose death? A lot of people struggle to understand why someone would choose suicide over accountability. Google narcissistic personalities, and Jen’s thought patterns will make a lot more sense to you. Aside from that, they were both unhappy women. They were isolated. Their finances were a mess. Colleagues recall how anxious Sarah would get when Jen called her at work – it seems that Sarah was fearful of Jen. There’s evidence that Jen was having an emotional affair and at one point thought about leaving Sarah. Now top that all off with an unsustainable family dynamic – you can control children, but children eventually grow up. The kids were going to talk.

I think Jen’s ego couldn’t wasn’t going to withstand her carefully constructed narrative being blown apart, and she certainly wasn’t going to allow herself to be arrested or face questioning about her parenting. Anyone who ever questioned her parenting was immediately cut out of her life. She just continued that pattern by cutting herself off from everyone, permanently. Taking the kids with her means that they can’t talk after she’s gone. She annihilated six innocent lives to preserve her narrative and reputation. I don’t think she thought this case would be investigated the way it was, or that all of this would come out. I believe she was expecting it would be ruled an accident and no one would look too hard into their lives.

I think Sarah was worn out, and she was the one with the prior record, so I’m sure she had concerns about what would happen to her. She had expressed to colleagues that she regretting having adopted six children. She was the only one working while, Jen went off to festivals and at the end, spent her days playing video games. Jen was verbally and emotionally abusive to her. One of the kids told the neighbors that Sarah had defended them early on, but over time, she not only stopped standing up for them, but also participated in the abuse. She was worn down by Jen and by their very isolated lives and by the abuse she was also taking, and likely also fearful of the legal consequences for her once the kids talked. I can see why she felt death was the best solution.

Sarah may be a murder victim herself. She was not. I’m confident of that.

Why didn’t Sarah just leave, or reach out to her family? She was an enabler. Jen was all she knew – they got together in college. She would be facing major legal consequences since she had a prior record. She had also been isolated and controlled and abused by Jen. After years of that, Sarah may not have had it in her to leave or ask for help. This kind of constant abuse and isolation over a period of years will fuck up your brain. That by no means excuses Sarah’s failure to help the children, but it helps explain how she got to the point where she willingly went along with a plan to drive them all off a cliff.

Whatever aspect of this case interests you and for whatever reason, don’t forget that Markis, Hannah, Devonte, Jeremiah, Abigail, and Ciera were the victims. I centered this blog post once again on Jen and Sarah, because people who want to understand why these children are dead have to look to their adoptive mothers to unravel what happened.

But this case is also about systemic racism in the U.S. and a broken foster care system. Racism contributed to these children’s death, both in a wider systemic context, and the fact that Jen herself was deeply attached to narratives of white saviorism and wanted people to see her as the selfless while mother who saved “crack babies” (her words) from horrible abusive bio families (also her story, not the truth). Turns out, the normal-looking white woman with the shiny happy Facebook narratives was the real monster.

I encourage people to read We Were Once a Family. It’s not an easy read, but it’s important to understand how our systems enabled a situation like this to occur, and it’s important to learn about the children’s bio families and what actually occurred. Jen’s narratives about the children’s backgrounds were as fake as she was.

Markis, Hannah, Devonte, Jeremiah, Abigail, and Ciera should all be young adults today, going to college or getting jobs, having relationships, figuring out who they are and who they want to be, reconnecting with their bio families who very much did want them and did fight for them, finding love and validation and safety. What was violently ripped from them is immense and overwhelming. To me, the word “tragic” feels like a woefully inadequate description of the loss of these six beautiful, innocent humans.